COMMENTARY No. 18

a CANADIAN SECURITY
INTELLIGENCE SERVICE publication

AZERBAIJAN AND ARMENIA: LAND OR PEACE?

March 1992

Unclassified

Editors Note:

As distant as the Karabakh dispute might have appeared to Western eyes a
few months ago, this simmering regional conflict has since intensified
dramatically, to the point now where grisly details of the violence headline the
daily news.

Fuelled by a history of ethnic, religious and nationalist differences,
the dispute, similar in many respects to others in the former Soviet Blocnotably
Yugoslaviacarries the potential for much wider international involvement.
In this case, the Russian Republic, Turkey, Iran and Iraq are, as the author
concludes, "vitally interested" in the outcome.

Dr. Allan Kagedan is a Strategic Analyst with the Analysis and
Production Branch of CSIS.

Disclaimer: Publication of an article in the COMMENTARY
series does not imply CSIS authentication of the information nor CSIS
endorsement of the author's views.

Mass killing has engulfed the conflict between the republics of Armenia and
Azerbaijan over the mountainous region of (Nagorno) Karabakh, located near the
border of the two republics. The battle resembles many other intractable
inter-ethnic fights: it features historically-rooted intergroup hatred, a
disputed territory and culturally distinct nationalities. Because similar
political conditions obtain throughout Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of
Independent States, the Karabakh problem, the first, post-Soviet version of the
Yugoslav conflict, is attracting international attention.

Yet, despite the intensity of the Karabakh conflict, neither side has thus
far conquered territory claimed by the other, and talk about the peaceful
resolution of the conflict recurs regularly. Indeed, in September 1991, the
Armenian and Azerbaijani presidents signed a peace agreement and pledged to
cease hostilities; but by March, the Azerbaijani leader, Ayaz Mutalibov, had
been forced to resign and the killing had intensified.

From Armenia's perspective, the Karabakh imbroglio is a uniquely ill-timed,
if predictable, side-effect of achieving sovereignty. For centuries, Armenians
have aspired to independence from domineering and sometimes violent neighbours
(British historian Christopher Walker estimates that the Turks killed one
million Armenians between 1915 and 1920). Just now, when independence has
finally been achieved, the nation finds itself embroiled in a bitter conflict.
This has provided renewed legitimacy for hardline groups, primarily the Armenian
Revolutionary Federation (ARF), which since 1891 has considered itself the
protector of Armenian interests. The ARF is well established among diaspora
Armenians, and some ARF members have expressed sympathy for attacks on Turkish
officials in the West, carried out by the Armenian Revolutionary Army (ARA) and
the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA).

How has the Karabakh dispute developed?

The Karabakh dispute grew out of the early Soviet policy of granting a
political status to territories, based on ethnic criteria, but then executing
the policy in a high-handed and haphazard manner. In the early 1920s, the
Armenians, and less so the Azerbaijanis, aspired to control two territories,
separated from the main body of their republics, but containing majorities of
their ethnic brethren. Karabakh, located within the administrative boundaries
of Azerbaijan, was 95% Armenian; Nakhichevan, located on the Turkish-Armenian
border, was 60% Azeri. Judging the numerically-superior Turks to be more useful
political allies than the Armenians, the Soviets, having promised these regions
to Armenia in June 1921, reversed themselves the next month and ceded them to
Azerbaijan, outraging Armenians. Worse, the Bolsheviks temporized and conferred
the status of autonomous regions on Karabakh and Nakhichevan, enshrining the two
as symbols, in Armenian eyes, of Bolshevik duplicity.

For the next 70 years, the highly restricted Soviet environment permitted no
direct dialogue between the aggrieved Armenians and the Azerbaijanis. Instead,
as might be predicted, Armenians began to leave the two regions, reducing the
Armenian percentage of Nakhichevan's population to near zero and Karabakh's
population to 75% by 1979, deepening Armenian anger. From an Armenian
perspective, the Soviets had robbed their nation of Nakhichevan and was slowly
fleecing it of Karabakh, too.

Soviet political thaws in the 1920s, 1960s and 1970s yielded loud but futile
Armenian demands for reunion with its brothers and sisters in Karabakh (which
Armenians refer to as Artsakh) lest it follow the de-Armenianized path of
Nakhichevan. Protests that sprung up during the post-1985 Gorbachev-inspired
thaw initially were no different. Karabakh Armenians and several of their
brethren in Armenia, Moscow and elsewhere sensed in late 1987 that the moment
was ripe to secure the Kremlin's acquiescence in the reunification of Karabakh
with Armenia. For one thing, reunion was what the people of Karabakh wanted and
Gorbachev was loudly proclaiming support for democracy; for another, Armenians,
such as economic adviser Abel Aganbeyan, had better access to the Kremlin than
did the Azerbaijanis (who were not identified with the pro-perestroika camp).

From November 1987 to February 1988, hundreds of thousands of
pro-unification Armenians demonstrated and signed petitions in support of the
Karabakh cause; media reports of violence against Azerbaijanis surfaced. On
February 22, 1988, everything changed: on that day 30 people, nearly all
Armenians, were killed in the Karabakh town of Sumgait. Overnight, violence
replaced protest; killings Fuelled the engine of vengeance and fear. In 1989,
Soviet internal security troops arrived, ostensibly to guarantee law and order,
but they proved to be ineffective. Since then killings, interspersed with
unsuccessful peace efforts, have become the norm.

Who are the key Armenian players?

The key actors on the Armenian side are the Armenian government, headed by
Levon Ter Petrosian; the Armenian population of Karabakh; and, to a lesser
degree, the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF) and Armenian militias
operating in Karabakh.

Among them, the best hope for a peaceful resolution of the conflict appears
to lie with the administration of President Ter Petrosian. A native of
Syria, Ter Petrosian rose to political prominence as a leader of the Karabakh
Committee which pressed Moscow for reunification. Seen in Moscow as a
trouble-maker, Ter Petrosian was incarcerated in 1987-88; his jail term earned
him political capital at home as a nationalist, and thus helped him rise in
August 1990 to the republic's presidency. Ter Petrosian was reconfirmed as
president in a free election on October 18, 1991.

Ter Petrosian, a pragmatist who understands that in dreams begin
responsibilities, believes that although Armenian reunification with Karabakh is
justified, it is unattainable for now. Given dire economic conditions
(exacerbated by the 1988 earthquake) Armenia was in no position to reclaim
Karabakh. For that matter, Ter Petrosian realizes (as did his predecessors in
the short-lived Armenia republic that existed between 1918 and 1920) that
Armenia is surrounded by more powerful and numerous Turks and that it is
therefore essential to foster good relations even with them.

Writing in October 1990, in the midst of heavy conflict over Karabakh,
Ter-Petrosian advised his countrymen that "...instead of an audacious,
romantic nation, we must become ... a cold, realistic and pragmatic nation;
whose each step must be circumspect, based on concrete and faultless
calculation." He asked his people "to avoid...grave confrontations..."
and instead embrace calm and leave to the next generations "the task of
realizing our other national dreams." In short, Ter-Petrosyan would demand
an end to anti-Armenian violence in Azerbaijan and respect for the human rights
of Karabakh Armenians; he is not in favour of fighting a war for Karabakh
territory and would be satisfied with keeping the borders of Armenia peaceful.

Ter-Petrosian's message is not shared by the Armenian Revolutionary
Federation, a political movement which, since at least 1891, has favoured
reclaiming lost territory as well as avenging the Turkish massacre of Armenians
through attacks on Turkish officials. The ARF re-established itself in Armenia
in the summer of 1991, only months before Ter Petrosian sailed to victory in the
presidential vote, far ahead of Sos Sarkisian, his ARF competitor, who garnered
only 4% of the vote.

The ARF fashions itself as Ter Petrosian's legitimate political opposition
and supports guerrilla fighters in Karabakh. One guerrilla group, called the "Freedom
Commandos of Karabakh," has stated in an advertisement in an Armenian
periodical that "The liberation of Karabakh...is the purpose of our
lives...." The ARF, which governed Armenia during its brief encounter with
independence (1918-20), aspires to govern the country again. It sees Ter
Petrosian as an opportunist who used the Karabakh cause to win the presidency,
only to abandon it thereafter.

While Ter Petrosian and the ARF vie for political supremacy in Armenia, the
strongest support for reunification comes from the Karabakh Armenians.
One of them, ecological activist Zori Balayan, who initiated the reunification
movement in 1987, believes that Azeri attacks on Karabakh Armenians fit into a
broader pattern of centuries-old Turkic imperialism, also called "Pan-Turanism."
According to Balayan's theory, Turan is the large, potential Turkic homeland,
which would unite all Turks from Azerbaijan to Turkey and the Central Asians
republics. This alleged Turkic dream, warns Balayan, threatens Armenians and
Russians alike and is gaining support among the former Soviet Union's Turkic
populations. In his view, Karabakh is just one battle in the wider future
struggle between Turks and non-Turks.

Whether or not they share Balayan's fears, the mass of the Karabakh
Armenians have always felt separated from and neglected by the Azerbaijani
government. After the 1988 Sumgait massacre, the Karabakh Armenians suffered
repeated attacks alternatively from the Azeris and from the Soviet Internal
Security Forces; they have responded by establishing self-defence units and
importing weapons from outside Karabakh to defend themselves. There is some
evidence that the Karbakh Armenians support the ARF. A journalist has reported
seeing the ARF banner flying from the flagpole at a municipal office in
Shahumian, a region within Azerbaijan adjacent to Karabakh. Given the amount of
blood that has already spilled, quelling these volunteer forces will not be
easy. Indeed, it is the well-armed militias that are waging war in Karabakh,
thus driving the political agenda as much as, if not more than, the elected
Armenian government.

On the other side, the Azerbaijanis.

In their view, to defend Karabakh is to protect their homeland.
Mirror-imaging Zori Balayan, Azerbaijanis believe the Armenians are engaged in a
guerrilla war against them, and are determined to defend themselves. Not
surprisingly, as the Soviet Union disintegrated and Azerbaijani nationalism
rose, the Azerbaijani National Front seized on the defence of Karabakh as a key
point in their program. And it can be expected that nationally-conscious
Azerbaijanis will keep Karabakh on the agenda, despite the inclinations of the
more conservative, traditional élite.

A natural historical development, in addition to nationalism, that
complicates the Karabakh problem is the return of Turkish influence to the
region. Azerbaijanis, a Muslim Turkic people, are assiduously cultivating close
cultural and economic relations with Turkey; most significant, in November 1991
the Turkish defence minister visited Baku and heard requests for weapons and
ammunition. Any evidence of a Turkish-Azerbaijani security alliance would be a
red flag for Armenians generally, and a prod to Armenian militants who have
sought for decades to avenge the Turkish massacre of Armenians.

Indeed, the warming Azeri-Turkish relationship may explain the December 20,
1991 assassination attempt on the Turkish ambassador to Budapest. A media
report claimed that the attack was the work of ASALA, in co-operation with Iraq,
which used the Armenians as a way to repay the Turks for supporting the United
States in the Gulf War. Another report, from Karabakh itself, claimed that
several dozen Iranians (who, like the Azeris, are Shiite Muslims) were fighting
on the Azerbaijani side. Willy-nilly, regional actors may be drawn into the
Armenian-Azeri clash.

What are the peace prospects?

The intensification of fighting since the collapse of the USSR in December
1991 has darkened the prospects of peace. A ray of hope amid an otherwise
gloomy situation rests in the pragmatism of the Armenian and Azerbaijani
presidents. The most promising (if unconsummated) peace agreement to date has
been the negotiation between Armenians and Azerbaijanis chaired by Presidents
Boris Yeltsin of Russia and Nursultan Nazarbayev of Kazakhstan. The choice of
the two guarantors of the peace related to historically good relations between
Russia and Armenia and Yeltsin's pre-eminent position in the former USSR; and
Nazarbayev's role as the leading Turkic politician in the region.

In its preamble, the document criticized the actions of the central Soviet
authorities regarding Karabakh over the past three years; it stated that the
parties agree to non-interference in the internal affairs of sovereign states
and the observance of civil rights of citizens. The agreement called for a
cease-fire, the repeal, before 1992, of all unconstitutional acts by Armenia and
Azerbaijan, the "recognition of authority of legitimate bodies of power"
and the withdrawal of all armed forces, except for Soviet (now Commonwealth)
forces. In the context of a disintegrating central military force, who is to
monitor the cease-fire? Who is to determine which acts are constitutional? And
who is to decide which bodies are legitimate?

In addition to these crucial clarifications, for a peace agreement to work,
the parties themselves must agree to exercise self-restraint and enforce such
restraint on militants in their own camp. This assumes that the Karabakah
Armenians compromise their independence demands, and that the Armenian and
Azerbaijani governments possess sufficient authority (and stability) to control
their own populations, to ensure observance of cease-fire terms. Furthermore,
regional powers such as Turkey and Russia would have to endorse the settlement
and, ideally, contribute to peace-keeping forces. For now, the cash-strapped
and beleaguered Russian troops are not in a position to do much more than
protect themselves until their withdrawal is arranged.

Beyond this, the principles of a peace accord should include:

no immediate altering of the current Armenian and Azerbaijani borders;

security and human rights guarantees for the Karabakh Armenians, monitored
by independent outside observers, as well as cultural autonomy and improved
standards of living;

unimpeded access to Karabakh by Armenians.

Once these minimum conditions are met and assuming peace holds, regional
autonomy for Nagorno Karabakh could be put back on the bargaining table. The
situation is too inflamed to permit a helpful discussion of this issue at the
moment.

If peace represents the best-case scenario, since December events have been
moving in the opposite direction. Fighting has escalated and the February peace
initiative mounted by Iranian Foreign Minister Velayati has not borne fruit.
The key question is whether the Armenian government can resist being dragged
into direct conflict with Azeri Forces. If all-out conflict erupts, Armenia
would try to secure control of Karabakh by conquering the Azerbaijani territory
that separates it from this region. Azerbaijan would counter-attack with all
the forces at its disposal. Though regional actors will be reluctant to get
involved, Iran and Iraq could move in to settle old scores, and Russia and
Turkey are vitally interested bystanders.

Thus far, the Armenian and Azerbaijani governments have been acting with
restraint, wary of the pitfalls of escalation. The resignation of Azerbaijani
president Mutalibov in early March amid calls by Azerbaijani legislators for a
tougher stand on Karabakh, however, signal a reversal of this trend. With luck,
fighting will diminish until each side reaches the conclusion that an untidy
peace is preferable to an unambiguous war. But in the interim, the conflict is
claiming more Armenian and Azerbaijani lives on the battle-front and may prompt
more attacks on Turkish diplomats abroad.

The views expressed herein are those of the author, who may be contacted by
writing to :